Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Show overload

Trish and I nearly OD-ed on musicals this weekend. With the unlikely triumvirate of Mamma Mia!, Toxic Avenger and Tin Pan Alley Rag (with an added viewing of last seasons La Cenerentola from The Met on Great Performances via DVR) our ears were confused and bleeding. Can one be musically bi-polar? Methinks “yes”!

I am almost embarrassed to admit that I actually enjoyed the movie version of Mamma Mia! Yeah, it ain’t gonna’ win any Oscars, but it was just so unapologetically stupid and cheesy that I couldn’t help but laugh along. I mean, Meryl must have known how ridiculous the script was, but she still committed to the role as if she were playing Lady Macbeth. Brava! Unfortunately, without the fun of Remington Steele belting out ABBA or Ms. Streep balancing in platform shoes and sequined-body suit, the stage show bores. The sole exception is the freakishly talented Carolee Carmello. Okay, I am bit obsessed with her, but she kicks ass. Her “Winner Takes it All” literally woke the sleeping audience just in time for the final scene of the show. Oy, and the chorus girls f*cking up the dance - and I use the term loosely as our high school kids could easily duplicate the Broadway choreography - during “Man After Midnight”? No joke, one girl messed up a step and then shrugged her shoulders at the audience. Really? Why not just flip us the bird and scream “Suckahs!” Oh well. At least I’ll be able to quench may obsession with Carolee’s crazy vibrato this spring when she is released from her Mamma-shackles to co-star in the upcoming The Addams Family musical on Broadway.

On paper it sounds iffy - a rock musical by Bon Jovi’s keyboardist based on an 80’s cult horror movie. Sometimes even the craziest idea just works. Hell, I’m sure Sondheim got an earful when he first pitched a musical version of Sweeney Todd. The Toxic Avenger ain’t Sweeney Todd, but it’s 100 intermission-less minutes of harmless camp fun with a five person cast ingeniously playing dozens of different characters. The score ranges from average to great, but always fun and often with clever lyrics. How can you not laugh during a show that includes songs titled “My Big French Boyfriend,” “Hot Toxic Love” and “Evil is Hot”? Granted, American Idol runner up Diana Degarmo is no actress, but girlfriend can certainly belt and riff with the best of ‘em. And for the three straight men who read my blog - mammary alert! You’ll get quite an eyeful of Ms. Degarmo’s ample bosoms straining to escape her very skimpy bra during one quite naughty blouse ripping scene. For the rest of us, there’s Nancy Opal’s show-stopping eleven o’ clock number, “Bitch/Slut/Liar/Whore.” And yes, it’s as good as the title implies. On a side note, I wish more shows had 4:00 PM matinees. You can enjoy a nice long brunch, throw in an extra mimosa or margarita and still sneak in a power nap before the show. Producers take note!

I honestly thought I’d be “musicaled-out” by Saturday night’s performance of Tin Pan Alley Rag. But hearing songs like “What’ll I Do” and “Blue Skies” after a weekend of ABBA and Bon Jovi only emphasized the lack of melodic, tuneful scores currently on musical stages. Not that I don’t appreciate a good pop/rock score, but there’s truly more complexity and emotional yearning in just that first upward chromatic phrase of “What’ll I Do” than in most current full musical scores. (Sigh) Oh well, fingers crossed that Sondheim still has another show left in his 79 year old bones. As for the show, it’s basically a musical theater version of an E! True Hollywood Story circa 1910’s. It was informative and entertaining but not necessarily very theatrically groundbreaking - this happened, then this happened and then I died. Now let’s shoehorn a song that fits the scene. Luckily, both Berlin and Joplin had interesting enough lives and a catalog of incredible music to carry this wisp of a concept along. Enjoyed it, but probably wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much had we paid full price. Thanks TDF!

Probably the best performance of the weekend was from our TV. Well, not literally, of course. Where the hell has Elina Garanča been hiding? I guess she hasn’t really been hiding, given she performs regularly in the world’s top opera houses and has had her performance in the title role of La Cenerentola transmitted internationally on TV. So more accurately, where the hell have I been hiding? Anyway, I now have another obsession. I'm usually not a sucker for mezzos (the notable exception being the goddess, Marilyn Horne), but Garanča's got the goods. Besides being friggin' gorgeous (straighties see below) she's got a machine-gun accurate bel canto and has an easy, natural acting style. The CD’s are already on their way from Amazon. Speaking of CD’s, I know I’m way behind the times, but I still can’t get myself to do the whole MP3 thing. Call me old fashioned, but I like leafing through a booklet. Somehow digital images and pixels aren’t the same as a having those glossy pages in your hand. (Extra big sigh)

Friday, August 7, 2009

Summer - Part 2 - camp

Summer - Part 1

If anyone has doubts about global warming, they need only spend a summer at the Pineda Conservatory. The CDC theatre is basically a huge oven. Add the body heat of a hundred hormonal teenagers and an audience of parents and grandparents and, well, we may as well be performing on the surface of the sun. This year we’ve added a third program. Because really, after 100 kiddies you don’t even notice 10 more. We’ve thankfully also expanded our full-time staff to include several of the older children and last year’s fave guest artists, Señor Chris and Mr. Dan. And as usual, we had our share of problem children, late night set-building/painting and nasty fast food. In no particular order, here are some of my fave highlights and WTF moments of the summer.

Two words - Pineda Idol. Where else are you gonna’ hear “Part of Your World” battling it out with a Miley Cyrus tune? And then we had our awesome judges. Thank you Ms. Lori (our middle school program dance teacher) for embodying the emotionally fragile and *alleged* drug-addled histrionics of Paula Abdul. Thank you Holly Curran (former Pineda Conservatory performer and current NYU drama major) for being our sweet and supportive Randy Jackson - only hotter, thinner and whiter. And last but not least, our Simon Cowell, Don Birely (costumer, performer and friend). I knew I could count on Don to give some real criticism. I was only disappointed that he wasn’t able to get at least one kid to break down. I want tears next year! Some definite changes for next summer - a time limit, a semi-final round and bigger hair all around. Come on people, have you not seen Bon Jovi?

Two more words - Leonard Bernstein. What other demented genius would have created theatre dance music in alternating 3/4, 4/4, 5/4 and 3/2 meters? Let’s get real, though, On the Town was Bernstein’s first Broadway score. I think the bastard was playing the I’m-a-serious-composer card and may have been showing off a bit. I mean, really, Lenny needed to change the meter every other measure to propel this story (three horny sailors find three horny sluts) forward? I don’t think so.

Accompanist trauma. You can’t swing a dead cat in the city without smacking at least a dozen accompanists. But just 20 miles southwest of the Big Apple is a piano playing wasteland. How can there be no competent pianists in New Jersey? I can’t fault Mr. B (our original accompanist) for cancelling out on us. I would probably choose my honeymoon over camp as well. Tropical sand, surf and sex or the CDC theatre in July with no air conditioning? Hmmm. Our next choice, a French Julliard Grad recommended by one of our former conductors, Michael Spassov, f*cked us over big time. The night before she was supposed to rehearse with us - three days before our first performance - she cancelled with less than 24-hours notice via voicemail. Classy. Her excuse: she went to the Performing Arts Library (the day before the first rehearsal!?!?) and they didn’t have a copy of the score so she wasn’t comfortable sight-reading. This, of course, was after Frenchie declined Val’s offer to Fedex a copy of the score the previous week. Oh well, karma’s a bitch so I’m sure Frenchie’s up for some big, nasty payback. Perhaps it all worked out for the best anyway, since we ended up with the wonderful Tony Bellomy, who was able to trek out to NJ from the city, sight-read the score fabulously and play the performance with only one rehearsal.

Ice cream wars. Let me fill you in on some back-story. About a week before the first show opened, we were suffering through the heat and humidity painting set pieces in the theatre parking lot when Hamdi the ice cream man showed up in his little white truck. After buying a round of ice cream bars for the family, Juan advised Hamdi to come back during the shows if he wanted to make a guaranteed killing. No air conditioning, hot lights and a building full of sweating bodies - it’s like an ice cream man’s wet dream come true. Anyway, Hamdi took us up on the offer and by midweek was showing up like clockwork before and after the shows and at intermission.

In gratitude for the business, Hamdi graciously offered the conservatory a percentage of all sales. Our symbiotic little relationship was thriving until midweek when an orange ice cream truck showed up, complete with its crazy owner. This biyatch materialized out of nowhere (we had never seen her in the four weeks we had been at the theater) claiming this was “her street” and that Hamdi was illegally selling on her turf. The street bickering finally escalated until crazy orange truck lady called the police. Well, before you can say “Ben & Jerry,” Juan was out on the street trying to divert audience members away from the invading orange truck. On top of that, a police lady was taking down everyone’s names, Trish and Liz (one of the CDC board members who happened to be at the show) were verbally sparring with the crazy ice cream biyatch (let’s call her crictch for short) and we had a formed a human teenage barricade in an attempt to block crictch’s truck from our overheated, ice cream-buying audiences. Oh well, just another average day at Pineda Conservatory.

As it turned out, the theatre is on private property so we can sell whatever the hell we want on it. But even with the police backing us up, crictch just wouldn’t back down. After the police drove off, crictch brazenly pulled her truck up to the front of the theatre in an attempt to steal customers. Crictch should’ve quit while she was ahead. No sooner had we explained the situation to Val, she was out in the street pounding on crictch’s truck and screaming at her for ruining “a non-profit fundraiser for the children.” Life lesson number one: You should never mess with “the children.” Life lesson number two: You should never mess with Val when she’s really angry and protecting “the children.” Needless to say, crictch sped off into the night and we never heard from her again.

That’s the summer in a nutshell. I’ll have to be a more dedicated blogger next year, since there’s just too much other fun, crazy, unbelievable and just plain stupid stuff to try and remember and document now that camps over. I’m definitely looking forward to next year but happy to have a couple of weeks to breathe until our first opera starts rehearsing in the fall.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Summer, Part 1 - Washington DC

The summer has dwindled away to only a few short weeks. Is September really just around the corner? Did I just see that Back-to-School display set up at the Duane Reade? What happened? Well, I guess I’ll just start babbling where I left off, just before the Pineda July 4th Weekend, and move forward until the post traumatic stress from camp kicks in and I start having fox hole flashbacks.

This July 4th, instead of getting drunk and passing out in the back yard as per usual, we decided to take a mini-vacation to Washington DC. Oh, wait. Let me backtrack a bit. We actually started our holiday weekend “In the Heights.” As a birthday/Anniversary gift for Juan and Val, Trish and I got tickets to the show. Val, of course, cried in all the right places. And even though we were exhausted from the opening weeks of Pineda Summer Conservatory, (forthwith to be referred to as “camp”) the salsa and meringue-infused score kept our blood pumping and eyes open. Unfortunately, it didn’t carry through to our planned all night drive to DC. By 4 am the mini-van was swerving and fishtailing all over I-95. We wisely decided to take a mandatory sleep break at a cheap hotel in Maryland and continued on later that morning.

The hotel, The Omni Shoreham, was movie-set gorgeous with white-gloved bellmen swarming the van as we pulled in. It was a total cliché but we were loving it. I only wish I had had a camera handy to capture their expressions as we popped the trunk. Instead of Luis Vuitton or Coach, these kind gentlemen were greeted by piles of music, discarded fast food containers and garbage bags full of clothes. With no time to pack, Trish had literally thrown her clean laundry directly from the dryer into garbage bags and into the trunk - luggage a la Hefty. Oh well, at least they’ll have a good story for the locker room.

The Omni Shoreham
The heat outside was almost unbearable for most of the weekend, but we did manage to hit several of the Smithsonian museums, pose outside the White House, laze around the pool, order excessive room service and get severely sunburned. So what did we learn from our little excursion to our nation’s capitol? Well, I’m glad you asked.

1. Museum holiday schedules do not make sense. On the weekend we celebrate the adoption of our Declaration of Independence, you are unable to view this venerable document because the National Archives is closed for the holiday.

2. People from Minnesota still refer to Asian-Americans as “Orientals.” After making friends with a group of band parents waiting for their kids to march down the parade route, one parent, obviously trying very hard to impress us with her worldliness said, “Our school is very diverse. We have a lot of different Orientals in our group - Filipinos, Chinese, and Koreans.” I’ll give her an “A” for effort.

3. Do not attend all-you-can-eat buffets the night of a Holiday. We were so excited for the hotel’s barbeque buffet. Who doesn’t love all-you-can-eat Kobe beef sliders and hot dogs, chicken, ribs, and mac n’ cheese? But it was clear the kitchen and front of house were severely understaffed due to the holidays. So after holding our reservation for nearly 45 minutes and then literally running out of food, we skipped out and headed to a local hang out for Sangria and middle eastern food.

4. Always complain nicely and graciously tip your server. Thanks to our calm and polite complaint to the manager (see #3), not only did he comp our meal, but he gave us vouchers for free buffet breakfast. Yum!


Breakfast in bed

5. Wear comfortable shoes because maps are totally misleading. Sure, a quarter inch doesn’t seem like much on a teensy-weensy map, but my how those inches add up. Because of the crowds and security fences blocking off most of the access into and out of the Great Mall, we hiked miles (literally) to find an open subway station. I estimated we walked approximately 6.5 miles in 90-plus degree heat.

6. Always carry lots of dollar bills. Sure, a life of luxury sure is fun, until you realize you have to pay for it. I haven’t passed out this many dollar bills since Cats closed - and I don’t mean the Broadway show. Oh, and if you have to ask, then you don’t need to know. Wink, wink.

And now more pictures!


Trish and I in front of Obama's crib
Me surprised at the port-o-potty's cleanliness

Me and Abe hangin'

Having fun by the reflecting pool

Glaring sun at the Lincoln Memorial
Coming up next, our second summer at the CDC…

I'm ba-ack!

Did you miss me? Don't answer that. Anyway, I'm going to take a couple of days to write about the past few weeks. Between rehearsals, painting and one (extremely) short vacation, there just hasn't been time. I haven't even seen a show - other than one I've directed or choreographed - in the last six weeks. So stayed tuned, lovelies.
"I'd rather be nine people's favorite thing thana hundred people's ninth favorite thing."

Jeff Bowen, Lyrics "[Title of Show]"